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Monday, June 06, 2016

Sooooooo...... SUMMER!!! I said it before, but I am over the moon happy to be back in relationship with our summer time schedule! We have our bucket list of activities, to be sure, but we are in a much more laid back state of mind.

HOWEVER.... since the Big Kid is home, I have to be much more aware of food and meals. Jacob has been on a mission to learn to cook, so I have decided to take one dinner time meal a week and have him help me- hopefully with end result in him taking the lead in planning/following the recipe/etc. We shall see....

Friday, June 03, 2016

Can I just tell you? How excited I am that it's summer? It was a brutal last few weeks around here. The 7 year old and his doting mother were both super ready to break up with our early morning wake-up calls....

We are ready for lazy mornings & such around here... but that doesn't mean we don't have some items on our Bucket List for the summer. We sat down and concocted our very own list of things we really want to do this summer. I'm trying not to over
schedule us.... which has actually been harder to avoid than I thought
it would be.

Monday, May 16, 2016

Well, well, well!
Long time, no bloggie.... like over a year! For any of you who still hop on over to my little corner of the interweebs, I'm sorry about that. I got TOTALLY burned out. I lost my joy of writing and of blogging.
....... And, I might have also forgot my security passwords and locked myself out of the blog!
...............Oops!

Anyway, I'm back! And, I'm back with Meal Plan Monday! I love meal planning! It takes the stress out of my week. Just knowing that the meals for the week are planned out and (sometimes!) prepped and ready to go makes that 4-7pm stretch of time go so much smoothly!

Here's what we are having for dinner this week!

Monday- left over bbq chicken, corn and zucchini from last night. (We had a great group of friends over for dinner & have lots of yummy left overs!)

Thursday, January 29, 2015

First off..... I'm no food stylist or food blogger. I love to cook and sharing my food with others..... all that to say, the picture I took at the bottom of the post..... well, it's not awesome.

However, this salad is.

Back story- I recently joined a co-op for fruits and veggies & I love it. My sister-in-law has been on my case (lovingly!) about joining for months. I kept putting it off.... but, seriously.... now? I'm kicking myself for not joining sooner. I love it! It's making me cook and serve fresh fruits and veggies every single day.

I'm super lucky that the Husband and the 6 year old are not picky eaters. In fact, Jacob loves broccoli. So, when I saw the big bundles of fresh broccoli in my co-op basket, I knew I had to make something super yummy with it. As a bonus, there has been some super awesome weather here in north Texas & we've been rolling with the windows down & doing a lot of playing outside.

It's been the perfect weather for Broccoli Salad!
Now, I have to admit, I didn't measure much in the recipe. I knew I wanted the broccoli to be lightly "sauced" with the dressing. Here's an outline of a recipe- add more or less of the dressing ingredients to suit your taste!

Chilled Broccoli Salad

a couple of heads of fresh broccoli
4/5 strips of cooked bacon, crumbled (save some of the bacon grease)
1/4 cup of red onion- finely sliced or chopped
1/2 cup craisins (I wish I had added more- but we were out)
shredded mild cheddar cheese

Dressing(these amounts are approximate. remember, you can add or use less to your taste)
1 cup (ish) of mayo
3-4 Tablespoons of white wine vinegar
2-3 Tablespoons of sugar
a little drizzle of the reserved bacon grease

To assemble the salad:
cut off the broccoli florets from the stem and through the florets into a bowl. Cook your bacon in a skillet, being careful not to burn it. Just get it nice and crispy. I chopped my bacon up before I cooked it, but you can totally crumble it up after. However you roll, that's cool. When your bacon is cooked, then drain it off & remember to save just a bit of the grease. Through the bacon into the bowl with your broccoli.

Add the craisins.
(I should add- the husband thought that some added chopped almonds or pecans or such would be great in this salad. If that's your thing, then add them now.)

It's time to make the dressing now.

In another bowl, add all the ingredients for the dressing & whisk away.
Now...... this part is totally an option. But. It's a tasty one. I added just a wee little bit of the bacon grease to the dressing.

I know. I know.
Not the healthiest salad in the world.
But, man, it was so good!

Add your cheese at this point and then cover and chill the salad for about 2 hours!
The longer you can let it set and chill, the better.
Serve to a grateful family!

Monday, January 26, 2015

He had his first actual, real life, for real, baby food moment at lunch today.

He's been showing quite a bit of interest in what the rest of the humans in the house are eating at different meal times. And, he's been known to try and steal sips out of whatever he sees other people drinking. (His father may have also slipped him a bite or 10 of avocado or guacamole here in the last month as well.)

I had been going back and forth on when to start him on "real food" lately. He's been showing all the signs, but.... I didn't start his big brother on food until he was a WHOLE lot closer to 1 year old. But, if there's one thing that Luke has been showing me (over and over again) is that he's a very different kid than his big bro.

And, I'm hoping that adding some food to his tummy might help with his reflux issues. Ugh. I'm so over that. I haven't really written about that on the blog. Honestly, it's been a whuppin. He's been projectile with his vomit pretty much since he was born. We've tried everything. Sometimes, it's better... sometimes (mostly), he and I go through 12 changes of clothing a day. "Burp" cloths are like gold around this house.

Anyway.
Today, was the day. I sat him up in his highchair, slipped a wipe-able bib around his neck & introduced him to the wonders of squash.

He figured out the process pretty quickly. All at once, when I dipped the spoon into the squash and brought it up to his mouth, he started grabbing the spoon out of my hand and taking it the rest of the way.

He was into it.

And, when he was done, the spoon made an excellent teether! I'm going to go ahead and say that some squash with his lunch was right up his alley.